COTABATO CITY, Philippines (October 31, 2025) — Police intelligence agents arrested a member of the Dawlah Islamiya, wanted for high-profile criminal cases pending in different courts, in an anti-terror operation in Barangay Ligao in Palimbang, Sultan Kudarat early Wednesday, October 29.
Local officials and members of two erstwhile secessionist Moro groups, who supported the law-enforcement operation of the Police Regional Office-12 in Barangay Ligao, said on Thursday, October 30, that the now detained Jaybee Mastura, also known as Abu Naim, is well-versed in fabrication of improvised explosive devices using either ammonium nitrate or potassium chlorate as blasting charges.
Brig. Gen. Arnold Ardiente, director of the Police Regional Office-12, told reporters that the suspect, who is a longtime member of the outlawed Dawlah Islamiya, was cornered by operatives from their Regional Intelligence Division and other PRO-12 units and personnel of the police’s Special Action Force in Barangay Ligao before dawn Wednesday.
Ranking members of the multi-sector Palimbang Municipal Peace and Council told reporters that personnel of different PRO-12 units and officials of the National Intelligence Coordinating Agency easily found Mastura in Barangay Ligao with the help of local officials, traditional community leaders and members of the Moro National Liberation Front and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, which have separate peace agreements with the national government.
Ardiente said the suspect is wanted for multiple murder, multiple frustrated murder, destructive arson and violation of the Republic Act 11479, also known as the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020.
Local officials said Mastura yielded peacefully when policemen barged into his hideout and showed him warrants for his arrest from different courts.
Ardiente said the raiding team had confiscated from him an improvised explosive device rigged with a blasting mechanism that can be detonated from a distance using a mobile phone.
Ardiente said he is grateful to all who helped them find the suspect in Barangay Ligao and to officials of the Army’s 603rd Infantry Brigade, which is based in Palimbang, for assisting in the operation that led to his arrest and detention.
The allies Dawlah Islamiya and Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters, both tagged in deadly bombings in Central Mindanao since 2014, have a reputation for fomenting hatred for non-Muslims.
Units of the 6th ID, PRO-12, the Bangsamoro regional police, city, municipal and provincial officials in Central Mindanao have jointly secured, via joint backchannel dialogues, the surrender in batches of 1,347 Dawlah Islamiya and BIFF members from across the region in the the past 38 months.
The former terrorists who have returned to the fold of law in recent years had been reintroduced to mainstream society via the police and 6th ID’s regional reconciliation programs for violent religious extremists.
Photo shows the arrested Dawlah Islamiya member Mastura, now in locked in a police detention facility.